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Training Nurses With Virtual Veins
meganthom writes "UK Haptics is developing a virtual hand to help nurses learn how to draw blood and put in IVs in a realistic manner. Though plastic models are currently used, these do not give new nurses the 'feel' for how much pressure to apply to the needle, and they cannot alert the nurse about pain. The system currently under development, which uses haptics, would make the learning experience considerably more realistic, even telling the nurse when too much pressure was applied."
I swear, I looked like a total friggin' addict. I heard to wear sweaters to keep that crap covered up on my arms for like 2 years.
Apparently, citrus fruits make a good replacement for human veins. She spent a lot of time practicing on oranges, grapefruits and whatnot.
I hope, for all husbands and roommates everywhere, that these come out soon and that they're very very cheap.
-- "A chicken is an egg's way of making another egg."
My mother is a nurse. This will NEVER be as cheap, or as realistic, as having the students practice on each other, like she did in medical school.
The real problem for trainee nurses is the reluctance, we're programmed since birth that you dont go around stabbing sharp metal things into people. The skill itself is trivial, hell if a strung out junkie can inject themselves, how hard can it be?
Practicing on dummies will never replace practicing on other students, boyfriends, etc. That addresses the real problem, the fear of hurting someone. Which was likely the reason your trainee was so nervous.
I don't need no instructions to know how to rock!!!!
After the first 20 or so victims you eventually figured out how to avoid leaving that nasty black welt on the inside of their arms (which incidentally also gave the impression they were doing drugs). Do a few hundred or so (myself and 6 other fifth semester students had to process about 2,000 people, including admin aides and misc school workers) and you get pretty good at it. You also develop this uncanny skill at tying the rubber pressure band around people's arms so quickly that they're being pricked faster than they can yell "HOLY CRAP THAT HURTS"
The hardest part was drawing from overweight female students. No veins visible anywhere in the arm. Sometimes we had to draw from a leg or hand vein or weird shit like that. Still, it was fun (hey, I wasn't the one being punctured) and it beat termodynamics lab for sure. We eventually wrapped it up in a couple of weeks and got some school t-shirts for our troubles.
Oh, and here's the obligatory old fart "we had to walk barefoot in the snow uphill (both ways) at 5:00 AM every day to get to school and we liked it" and all that.
My wife said they would practice on each other, drawing blood in class, thats how they got experience.
Now my wife is working, she stated docters hate giving shots, and only the people certified can give shots. And with the current trend to hire 1 nurse to 10 medical assistants, you better hope some have experience.